Try a cookie/candy exchange to save money this holiday season. Try it at work, church group, or your neighborhood. You make 1 dozen or so of your specialty and bring it to share. You walk away with an assortment of cookies or candy that you didn't make. This way you are not slaving away in the kitchen making 6 different things for the holidays.

The cookie exchanges around here, you usually have to bring 6-8 dozen of one cookie type. Then, you exchange a dozen with the other 6-8 people at the party, and you leave with a dozen of 6-8 different types of cookies.

I refuse to participate as my sisters and I spend about 12 hours baking together, and we are very particular about our cookies. We make really good ones, give lots away as gifts, and people love them. Most cookies we receive from other people or that are sitting out at work are awful by comparison, in our opinions. They are either not tasty, unattractive, or not even Christmas cookies in our opinion (sorry, but peanut butter or chocolate chip cookies are NOT Christmas cookies). I even know people who went to cookie exchanges with homemade cookies and received Oreos in return. There is no way I'd risk it!

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I'm participating in my first one with my SILs on Friday. We all shared what kind we would be bringing, so I think they'll be good. We are all bringing 3 doz and we'll get 6 of each kind.

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It's not what you make; it's what you spend.

My sister and I do a cookie exchange every year between ourselves. She'll make about 4 different kinds and so do I. This has worked out really well for us. Our church also does a cookie exchange type of thing, where everyone donates a couple dozen cookies, then you exchange for different kinds. I've never done this, mainly because there are only certain cookies my family likes, so it's just easier for me and my sister to make them.

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It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice.....

My family has done a cookie exchange too....and one year we even did a candy exchange...everyone had to bring one to two bags of wrapped Christmas Candy....we put all the candy into a big bowl and mixed it up and evenly divided it amongst each other....it looked really festive in our candy dishes with all the different types and we only had to buy a couple of bags...